Java, Perl, HTML ResourcesUnix and Linux operating systems

John D. Furber

You can easily support John Furber's ongoing work of connecting researchers and students and maintaining this web site.
and you can see a few recommended books and gadgets.
Each time you shop on Amazon.com, simply start from LegendaryPharma.com/amazon to connect to the Amazon website. Starting here will not interfere with signing in to your own Amazon account. You will get the same low prices and the same great service, and Amazon will pay a small referral fee to John Furber.

www.printerinks.com has a useful article, Coloring the Web about rendering colors on your web page.

Cedge's Color Center lets you interactively experiment with HTML color tags for background, text, and links. It instantly shows you on your screen how your choice will look, and shows digital and hex codes you need to produce it on your web page.

To convert your sound files from .wav format to more compressed (smaller) files, convert them to the MP3 file format. The MP3 format puts the sound into a smaller file for faster downloading by the people who visit your web page.

Macromedia produces professional software tools for producing animated web sites. They also provide free player plugins for browsers to view these sites.

Domain Names

Your website needs an address (URL), so that other people can access it on the web. You can get a URL to use (usually for free) from your ISP, a friend, or many organizations and major web portals. However, that URL does not allow you to use your own domain name.

The InterNIC web site has information on registering a domain name. http://www.internic.net/ InterNIC is a registered service mark of the U.S. Department of Commerce. This site is being hosted by Network Solutions, Inc. on behalf of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Register.com is one of many competing companies which have been accredited by InterNIC to register domain names.

Web Hosting

Once your web site is written, you will need to load it onto a server computer, so that other people can view it. As noted above, if you don't want to register your own domain name, you can get free web hosting from your ISP, a friend, or many organizations and major web portals. But if you have your own domain name, you will generally need to rent space on a server. Many companies offer web hosting service. A couple of alternatives are listed below:

Often, web hosting is included free with your ISP service; however, this does not allow you to use your own domain name. This free space is accessed through the ISP's domain name.(For example, http://members.aol.com/johnfurber )

Lobo.net http://www.lobo.net/ is a secure, reliable web host, based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, with economical pricing.

Java

Java is a platform-independent programming language (developed at Sun Microsystems, Inc.) well suited for a variety of tasks, including WWW applets and embedded systems programming. However, for computationally intensive tasks, many programmers believe that they get better speed and performance from such languages as C++, Fortran, or C.

Java programs which run in a web browser are called "applets," and require a plug-in for the browser which is usually supplied for free. Those which run without a web browser are called "Java applications." Run time modules for Java applications and programmers' development tools are available for free from Sun, Apple, and Netscape.

Perl

Perl is a portable scripting language which can run external programs, and process strings, files, and directories. Free versions of Perl run under Unix, MacOS, MS-DOS, VMS, OS/2, Plan 9, and Windows. Its source code and online manual are also available for free.

Programming Perl. Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, Randal Schwartz, (Second Edition, O'Reilly & Associates, Inc.) 1996. This is the Perl reference book with the dromedary on the cover. Its introduction to Perl is written at the level of experienced programmers. http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/pperl2/noframes.html

Unix

The Unix operating system, originally developed at Bell Laboratories (At that time ATT; now Lucent Technologies), is a powerful time-sharing system which supports multiple users, multiple tasking, and scripting. It was written in the "C" programming language to be easily adaptable to different processors and architectures. Variants of Unix run well on most large and small computers, PCs, and networks. Sun, Silicon Graphics, Hewlett Packard, and other computer manufacturers maintain versions of Unix for their computers.

Linux is a version of Unix developed by Linus Torvalds. Linux is grown and maintained by volunteers with a philosophy that open source code will allow developers and users to fix bugs and improve the system more readily. It has been adapted for most personal computers including PowerPC, Intel, Pentium, Cyrix, etc. An extensive list of Linux ports is at http://www.ctv.es/USERS/xose/linux/linux_ports.html

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